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Abstract |
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| "String theory has the potential to show that all
of the wondrous happenings in the universe—from the frantic dance
of subatomic quarks to the stately waltz of orbiting binary stars, from
the primordial fireball of the big bang to the majestic swirl of heavenly
galaxies—are reflections of one grand physical principle, one master
equation." - Brian Greene author of The Elegant Universe My brother was just accepted to MIT — an Astrophysics major. Apparently my parents gave birth to a son who thinks predominantly with the left side of his brain and a daughter who uses the other half — the right side. But like my brother, through years of searching for something to believe in, I have come to rely on science in understanding questions such as the ones French artist Paul Gauguin once asked, “Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?” These are questions we have all asked ourselves at least once in our lifetime — if not every day. While some choose to root their epistemologies in branches such as philosophy and religion, science has allowed me to come the closest to understanding my surroundings as well as the delicate intricacies that compose our world and our existence. Of course, being an artist I tend to be a visually-based person, which naturally leads me to create art that parallels with my thoughts. The art I have created for my senior exhibition is a culmination of my technical skills as an artist and my research in the field of science. My work aims at exploring the branch of physics known as string theory through time-based video production with the intent of combining the seemingly separate branches of science and art. Albert Einstein struggled for the last thirty years of his life searching for a unified theory that would be capable of encompassing nature’s density in a single framework. He buried himself in the complexities of life viewed from a scientific angle, attempting to decipher two of the most complicated things: time and light. Unfortunately, Einstein’s life came to an end before he came up with a master equation that would be the key to understanding physics. Scientists have since followed his lead in a search for answers — answers to the questions Gauguin has posed. This search has led to the development of a complicated theory that has the potential to unlock doors to the unknown. The string theory has become of particular interest to me because its basis lies in the marriage of the laws of physics —general relativity and quantum mechanics. Today, we have come to understand how the ideas behind physics affect us through these laws. General relativity is the understanding of how larger bodies of matter, such as planets are formed and interact while quantum mechanics is concerned with smaller particles. However, these two foundations of physics currently contradict each other. The laws for large objects contradict the laws for small particles, which actually behave in similar ways. Thus, either general relativity or quantum mechanics is wrong. Or, perhaps, both of them are incorrect. The string theory seeks to unify the two branches, proposing that everything is composed of tiny energy “strings” rather than individual points or particles, which link together everything in our world. Through vibrations, strings determine the components that make up both energy and matter. Philosopher Helen Buss Mitchell states, “Although it will require a radical reformulation of the way in which we understand space, time, and matter, string theory has vast explanatory potential.” Proving this theory could ultimately lead us to wonderful discoveries about the origins of the universe and could very well be the key to understanding the future as well. While this may seem to be a complicated and far-fetched idea, I believe that as the theory continues to develop, our paradigms concerning the world we know (or the world we think we know) will drastically change. Some day, this theory will not only be understood by those involved with physics, but it has potential to affect our entire cultural epistemology concerning origins, endings, and many things in between. During the Renaissance a, “Tangibilization of science…was complementary to an intellectualization of all mechanical professions, pre-eminently the arts.” Leonardo da Vinci’s sketches connected the realms of science and art in ways both scientist and artist could understand. It is in my view that an unfortunate division between these fields has since occurred. The two branches of knowledge are now commonly seen as being almost entirely incompatible. Physics, especially, has been completely separated from the realm of the visual, possibly because its foundation lies in mathematics. A physicist lives with the stereotype of being, “a logical, systematic and very boring individual,” with those looking upon physics as containing, “no room for creativity or faith, except perhaps faith in the power of mathematics.” We must keep in mind that science requires breaking down current paradigms and envisioning ideas that do not yet exist. “Often this involves an intuitive leap that is no less an act of creativity than painting a masterpiece.” Author of The Elegant Universe, Brian Greene, states, “It is little wonder that artists, writers, composers, and filmmakers are finding resonance between their work and these scientific challenges to the status quo.” However, he also cautions that the integration of science, specifically physics, into our collective worldview is a slow process. In a time where technology has enabled us to understand much that surrounds us, we are often resistant to new ideas that contradict what we already know. My goal is to bring us one step further in thinking of the correlation between science and art by making the string theory a central theme in my work. Locating both myself and my work in a historical context is of great importance to me. The twenty-first century is a time in which scientific discoveries are being made at a rapid pace, which has — and will continue to — alter the way we experience and react to the world we live in. Two years ago, the belief that extra dimensions could exist was only brought up in the realm of science fiction. Now, we see that the existence of multiple dimensions is feasible. We are on the on the edge of detecting something wonderful — something that will change our ways of thinking and hopefully urge us to integrate science into our cultural discourse. Science contains a strong visual component, which appears to be frequently ignored or unnoticed. While at first glance, this branch of thinking may seem to be a complex jumble of mathematic equations and formulas, science attempts to explain the world we live in, which — for many of us — is frequently defined by what we see. Scientific experiments or observations often result in the production of aesthetically appealing images. For example, the magnification of tiny particles can produce interesting and colorful images, often mirroring the abstraction and aesthetics of modern art. Many science textbooks contain illustrations and diagrams of theories or objects that cannot be photographed or even seen with the aid of technology, such as particles which are invisible to the human eye or a rendition of what the entire universe looks like. While viewing microscopic images or pictures taken from space may be interesting, the idea that the string theory remains unrealized holds much more appeal. While most science is based on fact or “truth”, there are certain levels of ambiguity and mystery pertaining to such a theory. As a theory, it has not yet been proven, which means we are left to depend on our imaginations in predicting the results. I am intrigued by the excitement of leading scientists concerning future implications of the string theory and my work aims to parallel with scientists’ expectations in the beauty of the undiscovered. As Peter Weiss, author of the article “Hunting for Higher Dimensions” says, “String theory, which may one day replace relativity and provide a unified theory of everything, is beautiful, complex and involves a great deal of creative genius on the part of its proponents.” Through my art, I intend to join together the scientific, visual, and conceptual ideas behind the string theory. Gregory Kepes, author of The New Landscape in Art and Science, brilliantly states on the joining of art and science, “It is an integrated vision that we need; but our awareness and understanding of the world and its realities are dividend into the rational — the knowledge frozen in words and quantities — and the emotional — the knowledge vested in sensory image and feeling.” We are a culture that is constantly changing — constantly coming up with ways to make new discoveries and to re-evaluate the world. At the same time, we are also a culture which is becoming more engaged with our sight. In a single day, we each encounter a seemingly uncountable amount of images. Thus, I feel as though combining science and art will allow us to understand the rational in a visual way, enabling us to develop a visual discourse for scientific discoveries while simultaneously causing us to question our subjective “truths”. After giving consideration to many different mediums, I have decided to illustrate my interest in the string theory through stop motion animation. Influenced by the works of William Kentridge, a South African artist, my pieces are short films that employ the use of charcoal on a single piece of paper, continually being reworked. A digital camera set on a tripod captures each image that is produced. When combined, this results in a relatively smooth-flowing film. Conceptually, this method parallels nicely with the realm of science. New discoveries are constantly being made; old ideas are always being revised. Like science, the sheet of paper I am working from is repeatedly crafted to depict a different scene. There is not a single, finished drawing that is being worked toward. Instead, each individual image — which is ultimately a very small part of the final product — makes the film understandable, just as each tiny particle in our universe is an integral part of the whole. Time is also an important component. The basis of the string theory lies in understanding the state of our universe, which obviously changes throughout time. Using time-based media allows mimicry of our constantly changing world. Of course, the fact that we will probably never fully understand our universe lends a certain factor of ambiguity to my work. Kentridge says his own work is, “an art of ambiguity, contradiction, uncompleted gestures, and certain endings…” While my central conceptual idea differs greatly from Kentridge’s (who focuses on issues of politics and apartheid), I believe that we share similar ideas about leaving the viewer with a certain feeling of ambivalence. Art historian Michael Godby says of Kentridge’s work, “The elements of line and tone, especially in the broad strokes of his large drawings, constitute equivalents for, rather than simulations of, the reality that a pictorial language based in color would produce.” This parallels with my work because I am depicting what cannot yet be seen. I feel as though my work, like Kentridge’s, is an exploration of how I see my reality. The images in my films are what I have envisioned science to look like and so I have taken a very objective field — science — and transformed it into my subjective views. This interest in ambiguity also stems back to my love of Surrealistic artwork. My first attempts to understand the world and my place within it were experimentations with the unconscious or subconscious. I thought, perhaps, I would be able to find answers to my questions through dreams, turning to artists such as Salvador Dali and Rene Magritte as inspiration. I became disengaged with my Surrealistic work rather quickly and began to see it as conglomerations of symbols that I had little personal attachment with. Introduced to the works of Eve Andree Laramee prior to my final year at St. Mary’s, I began to recall the influence of a lecture given by Stephen Hawking which I had attended in the summer of 2002. Joining together my interests in science and in the unknown, I began to investigate how we collect information. My work in the previous semester concerned the creation of a fictional character who was involved with proving the string theory. Though I have since decided that Surrealism and fictional characters are not the key to the answers I have been searching for, my art still contains Surrealistic qualities. Kentridge’s work has been said to make use of a neo-Surrealistic technique, which has, “…encouraged Kentridge to validate the accidents of chance, on the one hand, and dream inspiration, on the other.” Employing the use of abstract shapes and images will not only tie the films together, but make the viewer not completely aware of what, exactly, they are seeing. Many of the images in the three films are comparable to shapes we see when we close our eyes, thus lending a dream-like quality to my work. Textbooks have also become a useful visual source for my work as far as exploring such abstract shapes is concerned. I find aesthetic appeal not only in illustrations, but also in mathematic equations themselves. No doubts arise when it comes to thinking about whether scientists think visually about their theories or experiments. A scientist must step outside the boundaries of the visual world we are used to seeing in order to develop a way to introduce the public to new ideas. Stephen Hawking’s books, particularly The Universe in a Nutshell, have been of great importance to the development of my understanding of science. The illustrations and diagrams contained in this book allow me to see how someone else has visualized the universe, which has aided me in shaping my own visions. There are many combinations which have occurred in my work: the subjective and the objective, abstract and realistic, unconscious and conscious, fiction and fact. In my eyes, the resulting product ties these aspects together into a personal representation of ideas that I hope will assist me in further understanding my experiences and my world. It has been said that, “When formulating a successful theory, or performing a successful experiment, a scientist creates a new canvas through which we can all observe the world in a new light.” My work, like the research a scientist completes, aims to make the viewer see physics in a different way — a more subjective and beautiful way. Helen Buss Mitchell states, “A number of philosophers have suggested that the search for truth leads us inevitably to the realm of the aesthetic — that through art we can learn the truth about reality.” In my conquests, I have yet to find said “truth”, but in creating art I feel as though I have made an attempt — one step closer. I have hope that my work will influence others to think about their own realities and cause them to ask those three questions that never leave my mind, “Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?” BIBLIOGRAPHY
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